


The Squares are Filling In

by Syddoc



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-20
Updated: 2012-08-20
Packaged: 2017-11-12 13:04:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/491324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syddoc/pseuds/Syddoc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘It’s a similar situation to his ongoing relationship with River Song, isn’t it? He’s seen her death, and yet now he’s filling in all the squares before that. But when all of those squares are filled in -<br/>… Steven interjects. “At some point he’ll realise that he’s filled all that in now, and there’s no more space. And at that point, it’s over - and she properly becomes dead for him.’<br/>—Steven Moffat interview, DWM Issue 447</p><p>The Doctor can feel the squares are all filling in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Squares are Filling In

_________________________________________________________________________  
He notices the sign on the door first. No longer ‘Dr River Song’ it’s now ‘Professor River Song’. He’d known she’d work for it, seeing as he’d spoiled her good and proper way back before he knew better. He takes a deep breath. Rule 7, he thinks. But he is scared and running is so, so tempting. At this stage he can feel the timelines constricting around him, around them, he can feel the gaps he can visit in getting so, so, small and as much as he wants to see her he wants to run from these days. 

He knows he is losing her.

He knocks (he’s learnt that knocking is useful) and hears her soft “Come in.” He wonders if she can feel him on the other side of the door the way he can feel her… she resonates so brightly in his time sense and she is unmistakeable. If she could still regenerate and change her face he would still know her.

He pushes aside the guilt that thought brings and enters her room -he is relieved. Her hair is still that glorious blonde colour it’s been for most of their marriage. He starts to breathe again. He isn’t sure how he won’t run the day he finds her with her hair glowing with the reddish tinge he’d so admired the first time they met. Just like the change in title on her door it will be another outward sign of another gap closed, her - them - another step closer to being a memory .

But she is there and her smile is warm and her arms are around him and she is looking into his eyes and he has her for this time, and it won’t be the last.

“Hello, Sweetie,” she smiles up at him.

“Hello, Dear,” he replies and sweeps her off to the TARDIS for another adventure.

**Author's Note:**

> Author note: I think both the Doctor and River must rejoice when their older selves are together - but always, always with trepidation that each meeting is closer to the last ... more so for the Doctor, I think, as he definitely knows how they end...


End file.
